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06-12-2006

INFOTE MAIN SPONSOR AT THE EXHIBITION: NONDA SIX DECADES OF ART 1940-2000

The Benaki Museum is pleased to present a large retrospective exhibition of artwork by the painter
and sculptor Nonda (b.1922-2005). This exhibition will include selections from six decades of this
major artist's work from the 1940's through the 1990's. It is a unique opportunity for the public
to remember or rediscover the life and work of an important Greek painter who spent nearly fifty
years of his life producing art in the vibrant years of postwar Paris. Hailed as one of the leading
painters in the 1950's Ecole de Paris, and famous for scandalizing Athens with his early nude
paintings, Nonda went on to create powerful and unconventional work beyond the artistic trends of
his times. Nonda belongs to the movement of the post war "Ecole de Paris", a term used to describe
the Modernist artists centered in Paris during the period following the Second World War. In
addition to his use of blood as a medium, he was known in Paris for creating the four annual Pont
Neuf Exhibitions with the help of André Malraux and for reintroducing the concept of outdoor
exhibitions in Europe. In 1963 he built a monumental sculpture of a Trojan Horse under the Pont
Neuf inside which he lived for the duration of the show. Always innovative, Nonda was described
early on by the artist D. Galanis as having "a rare artistic temperament".Nonda is an Expressionist
painter whose main artistic inspiration came from the female and animal form. This in later years
was to manifest itself in abstraction as well as in large scale abstract sculpture. His body of
work includes painting, drawing, engraving, hand-made furniture, objects including glasses, bowls,
vases etc, small and monumental sculpture. The exhibition "Nonda. Six Decades of Art 1940-2000"
will be accompanied by a book which includes art historical texts about the artist by art
historians Emmanuel Mavrommatis and Manos Stefanidis. The exhibition is curated by Joanna
Papadopoulos and Natasha Karagelou.
Source: INFOTE